USBMIS is proud to feature for Beta testing, Just the Facts in Emergency Medicine by the American College of Emergency Physicians and McGraw-Hill Publishing. This invaluable reference for Emergency Physicians and trainees is geared toward providing a rapid and comprehensive review for core topics in Emerbgency Medicine.

"Personal digital assistants (PDAs) and other handheld devices are soon expected to become even more valuable to radiologists. Recent advances in PDA technology, including high-resolution screens, increased storage capacity and wireless networking, are leading to the development of more sophisticated radiology-specific applications.

'I think we're at a turning point where the applications are just starting to catch up with the technology that's available,' said William W. Boonn, M.D., a radiology resident at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia and also the founder of the Web sites MedicalPocketPC.com and MedicalTabletPC.com.

Dr. Boonn and Adam E. Flanders, M.D., a neuroradiologist from the Department of Radiology at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital in Philadelphia, conducted a survey of RSNA members to gauge the use of PDAs in radiology and compare it with other medical specialties. Their article appears in the March-April issue of RadioGraphics."

A small handheld device may lead to big improvements in patient care when Blue Cross of Northeastern Pennsylvania begins distributing 250 handheld computers to physicians in an effort to improve patient safety and to reduce prescription drug costs. 

from E-Health Insider:

Doctors in the US are not generally making use of PDAs to improve patient care, and those that do use handheld devices tend to stick to administrative rather than clinical tasks, according to a new survey.

Forrester Research and the American Medical Association interviewed 1,331 medics and found that although 57% owned PDAs -- more than five times that of the rest of the population -- only 6% regularly used them to access patient records, and 5% to check laboratory results.

The researchers argued that a large part of this result was down to partly down to the usability and specifications of the PDAs they use, but also partly down to non-intuitive EMR software: "Hardware improvements in battery life, screen resolution, and connectivity won't be enough to convince handheld-enabled physicians to view their devices as critical clinical tools -- especially if they must wrestle with clunky EMR applications that make data input and extraction a complex, time-consuming process of clicking through multiple screens."

There has been widespread adoption of personal digital assistants (PDAs) within medicine in recent years. However, information on the prevalence and usage of these devices among radiologists is limited. A survey was designed and mailed to randomly selected members of the Radiological Society of North America to determine the percentage of PDA users, their use patterns, and the types of applications that they would like to see in the future. The use patterns of attending radiologists were compared with those of trainees (residents and fellows). Overall usage was also compared with the relevant findings in two surveys of internal medicine users.